1. One might begin to wonder if McLovin' reads Hogs Haven. After all, I screamed until I was blue in the face for this team to draft an offensive lineman in the first round, and just when it appeared that it was simply not going to happen...wow! I wasn't alone in identifying the need, and I wasn't alone in loving Scherff, although depending on trade-back scenarios, there were other offensive linemen many of us would have considered.
2. My guess is that the Redskins fielded calls from numerous teams looking to move up and grab Leonard Williams. We had been hearing for weeks that this draft had maybe a dozen elite players in it. We know that McLovin' feels strongly about adding elite talent. Based on this, I am assuming that the Redskins were willing to move back a few picks but not willing to move back outside of the top ten or twelve picks. Of the teams that McLovin' would have seriously considered swapping picks for, there didn't appear to be one willing to pay enough to make it worth Scot's while. After months of smokescreens and lies, teams looked supremely confident in the way picks were going to fall, leading to a lot of staying put at the top of the draft. When the Redskins came on the clock, I fully expected to hear the trade announced. When Goodell read Brandon Scherff's name, I pretty much lost it.
3. This is a watershed moment for me. For YEARS, I have been begging for a meaningful investment in the offensive line. Blue-chip, hardhat-wearing offensive linemen are what makes this league tick (I suppose the lunch pail-toting defensive linemen provide the tock). Trent Williams was a great pick for us, but has become nothing more than an island of competence in a sea of inconsistency and disappointment. To say that we didn't need to find a horse in this draft that was capable of running alongside Trent would have been irresponsible.
4. Getting Scherff does not remove the priority that belongs on the rebuilding of the offensive line. I feel like I am channeling my inner Andy Dufresne. When he got a few boxes of books from the board to start his prison library, he committed to increasing his efforts to achieve even greater results. Similarly, I think we will double down here ahead of next year's draft to ensure that we continue the long-term project of putting a talented group of men in front of whatever quarterback we have in town.
5. This was by no means a one player draft. Thanks to the abundance of time that exists between now and training camp, we will focus in on each of the new guys one at a time and up close. Still, it is hard to look at what McLovin' did with the fifth overall pick and not see direction, purpose and strategy. What it lacked in sexiness, it made up for in conviction. I have said it plenty, but it bears repeating: The best offensive lineman in any draft is automatically in the best player available discussion. People are getting bent out of shape that we "drafted Scherff too high." We're not talking about a guy who was slated to go 20th, or even 15th overall in this draft. Nobody expected him to fall past the Giants at #9, so picking him a mere four picks higher than that hardly seems like a reach. Scherff was considered among the players everyone thought of as a blue-chip talent in this draft. He was going to be drafted in the top 10 by someone. Of all the problems you can have with this pick, reaching for the OL is one with which I wholeheartedly disagree.
6. As for picking Scherff over Leonard Williams, you won't hear me make any case about one being a better player than the other right now. I will offer you this instead: the NET benefit of bringing in Scherff is greater than the NET benefit of adding Williams. I don't doubt that Leonard would come in and contribute immediately to our defensive line, but we just signed three guys there. One is 26 years old and the other two are 28 years old. Williams would have decent odds to win a starting job, but the additional production he would have over, say, Terrance Knighton or Stephen Paea would be less than the additional production Scherff will have on our offensive line. The player he puts on the sidelines will likely be considered a lesser contributor than whatever defensive lineman that Williams would put on the sidelines. Considering both Scherff and Williams were considered top talents in this draft, landing the one that increases the overall production of the team more has to be the right answer, and I believe that answer is the mean-looking kid from Iowa.